Spiral Tower Review: Pure, Mundi, and the Suddenly: D.M. Ritzlin’s Against the Demon World



Pure, Mundi, and the Suddenly: D.M. Ritzlin’s Against the Demon World
Book: Against the Demon World (2026)
1365 words

Modern fantasy is suffering from a crisis of the map and the archive. For years, floundering in the wake of the epic, we have become a genre of surveyors and historians, obsessed with the slow-burn arc and the crushing weight of cause-and-effect. We demand to know the tax policy of the kingdom before we are permitted to see naked steel. We need to understand the "magical system" of the universe before we are permitted to see a sorcerer hurling fireballs. In this disenchanted, quasi-bureaucratic landscape, the narrative often feels like a slog through a digital simulation, or an alien planet with 1.5 Earth g's of atmosphere: heavy, flattened, predictable, slow-motion, devoid of the thrilling disorientation and forward momentum that once defined the pulp tradition.

Enter D.M. Ritzlin. In his latest foray, Against the Demon World (2026), Ritzlin performs a kind of narrative exorcism. He eschews the heavy, importunate worldbuilding of his contemporaries and instead leans into a structure that feels ancient, visceral, and, I dare say, sublimely fun.

To understand why Ritzlin’s work feels so charged, we must look backward, past the Inklings of the mid-century, to what literary theorist Mikhail Bakhtin called the "adventure-time" of the Ancient Greek Romance. In those Hellenistic novels, time was not a matter of character growth or historical progression; it was a sequence of "suddenlys." A hero is walking; suddenly, pirates appear. He escapes; suddenly, a storm wrecks his ship. Bakhtin called this the "chronotope" of the adventure novel--a world where the characters are static, tested by a catch-and-release cycle of fate and chance.

Ritzlin understands, and leans into, this adventure chronotope better than almost anyone writing in sword and sorcery today. Against the Demon World does not ask us to contemplate the hero’s childhood trauma; it does not ask us to examine the hero's singular identity; it does not ask us to examine our lives. Instead, it asks us to survive the next ten pages. One of my favorite tongue-in-cheek moments is when the main character, Atok, has briefly paused to contemplate the destruction of a succubus, Heltorya, for whom he had complex feelings. He lingers for a heartbeat on the precipice of a modern character arc, a moment where a less confident writer might have surrendered to the bougee responsibility of psychological realism. But Ritzlin’s narrator quickly steers us back to the surface, with the narrative equivalent of a slap to the face and a dash of cold water: "There may have been other reasons, but he did not care to examine his personal feelings more closely." It is almost as if the narrator is letting the boundaries of the genre's chronotope show. Here is the boundary, it says; contemplate it, make your peace with it, before we move on to the next adventure.

Against the Demon World is a narrative of the Bakhtinian hiatus--that glorious gap of unresolved conflict between the beginning and the end where the world is governed by Tyche (Fate). In Ritzlin’s Demon World, space is abstract and alien. It is not a place to be mapped, but a series of thresholds to be crossed. The flight on an alien skyship from a demon moon to terra firma is treated as an ellipsis. From one chapter to the next, we are on earth and then we are dragged through a portal to hell. This is strategic spatial vertigo and distortion. This is the "low" comedy of the Menippean satire: a world of fleshy, grotesque encounters where the hero is a fixed point of grit against a shifting tide of contingency and chaos swirling around. This is catch-and-release, with a diabolical twist. The hero is caught in a nightmare, released into a fever dream, and caught again. There is one scene, subtle but pregnant with meaning, when the imp Scrotar sits in the throne room of the demon lord Nelgastrothos, toying with a soul. It is worth quoting at length:

He knelt beside his master's throne, wholly absorbed in toying with a glass cylinder which was two feet high and half again as wide. Contained within was the image of a long-haired Nilztiria maiden, paling in color yet luminescent. Scrotar tapped the glass with a stubby finger, and the cylinder momentarily filled with blue lightning. The maiden writhed in pain. Though her mouth opened to scream and cry, no sound could be heard beyond the confines of the glass. Scrotar gleefully touched the cylinder again. This time when the lightning vanished, the girl collapsed. The imp laughed like a child delighted by a new toy.

Here a sadistic imp takes pleasure in torturing an innocent soul. By analogy, what else does an author in this tradition do? They create a protagonist, a hero we become emotionally invested in; once our emotional entanglement with the character is established, they process them through the painful crucible of a conflict-rich environment. And in the comfort of our armchair, boards and leaves in hand, we cackle as they struggle for survival. This is a perfect allegory for legitimate adventure narrative shorn of all its superfluities and niceties.

But why is this aesthetic sadism so fun? Because it restores the immediacy of the encounter. By utilizing the sequential logic of the classical Greek novel, Ritzlin avoids the drab blur of triteness that plagues modern high fantasy and haunts contemporary sword and sorcery. His approach is a corrective, harmonizing with what aesthetic theorist Viktor Shklovsky argues is the main function of art: to restore strangeness to the world we have become dangerously habituated to. As Shklovsky famously wrote:

And art exists that one may recover the sensation of life; it exists to make one feel things, to make the stone stony. The purpose of art is to impart the sensation of things as they are perceived and not as they are known. The technique of art is to make objects 'unfamiliar,' to make forms difficult, to increase the difficulty and length of perception because the process of perception is an aesthetic end in itself and must be prolonged.

Ritzlin gives our imaginations the widest possible room to swing, prioritizing the thrill of the "suddenly" over the boredom of the map, the dustiness of the archive, and the pedantry of the "magical system." (By the way: a "magical system" is a pernicious paradox, and its growing conceptual ubiquity is a discouraging symptom that our cognition has been shifting down from the heights of imagination to to the depths of mere calculation. For what else is magic but a refutation of the systematic?)

Reading Against the Demon World is a punk gesture--a deliberate act of genre-defiance that many, conditioned by the status-conscious prestige of the relevant and the relatable, will simply fail to grasp. Ritzlin writes in the tradition of Clark Ashton Smith, who famously declared, Neither the ethics nor the aesthetics of the ant-hill have any attraction for me. To read a Ritzlin novel--like reading a Clark Ashton Smith story--is to refuse to be bored, to refuse to navel-gaze, and, most importantly, to refuse to be responsible. This type of story rejects the modern mandate that fantasy must labor to save, mirror, or justify the ordinary world. It is unapologetically puerile (read pure).
 
To demand that sword and sorcery tie itself to the real is to betray the core of the tradition. We read to be boyish, to be girlish--to deviate from the proper and reclaim the unmanageable weirdos within. We seek the spirit that sees a stick as a sword and a windmill as a giant; we seek the parts of ourselves the ordinary world has worked so hard to file away, forget, and finally, to kill. We seek the "suddenly" because it shatters the glass of the archive and the office. Because, in the best sword and sorcery, we are reminded: the ordinary is merely an ordered zone, governed by an order designed to keep you in order--and thus, it is a zone to be avoided, to be escaped, at all costs. Ritzlin doesn't offer a mirror; he offers an exit. And in a (not quite demonic) world obsessed with mundane (read mundi), that exit is the most radical gesture of all.

About the Reviewer: Jason Ray Carney is the Managing Editor of Spiral Tower and a Senior Lecturer in the Department of English of Christopher Newport University. CNU Faculty Page

About Spiral Tower Reviews: The authors who maintain the pulp genres of sword and sorcery and cosmic horror merit support. Financial support is key but there are other ways the cash-strapped can show support: engaged reading and thoughtful analysis. Literary movements emerge through the interactions of editors, authors, publishers, and amateur literary journalists. Learn more about contributing your review here. We are happy to work with first time reviewers! No previous writing credits required!

To Walk on Worlds is Cool, Man, reviewed by Jason Ray Carney
Tanith Lee is the Empress of Dreams, review by George Jacobs
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Spiral Tower Review: "Do I look like a slave to you, dog?" Steve Dilks' Bohun: The Complete Savage Adventures and Heroic Tenacity

 

"Do I look like a slave to you?" Steve Dilks' Bohun: The Complete Savage Adventures and Heroic Tenacity
Book: Bohun: The Complete Savage Adventures (2024)
1697 words

One of the key facets of a hero is their agency rather than their response to adversity. Heroes are protagonists; they proceed toward agony and conflict. But not all heroes fit this mold. Some heroes are less defined by their agency and more by their adversities and challenges--by the events that befall them. We recognize their heroic qualities in how they react to their fates. One of the best examples of this is in film history, First Blood (1982), a favorite growing up with me, my older and my younger brother (my parents were very half-hearted censors). Fans of this movie know: John Rambo doesn’t seek trouble. He just wants to find his friend, have a sandwich, and pass through town. Unfortunately, he encounters an overzealous local sheriff, Will Teasle, who mistakes him for a drifter, insults him, incarcerates him, and ultimately abuses him. Rambo reacts to these instigations by blowing up the entire town and maiming numerous public safety and security officers, pure 1980s action movie machismo distilled to a fine spirit. While Rambo shows agency in the end (that suturing scene!), an important narratological distinction needs to be made: in terms of inciting action, Rambo is the victim of a brutal and unfair interference in his difficult life.

Matthew Arnold, the famous Victorian critic and poet, had this to say about the most famous paragon of heroic victimhood, Odysseus (or Ulysses, rather), and the poet who sings him to life, Homer:

"[Homer] he makes Ulysses the great type of the enduring and laborious man, who, through patience, courage, sagacity, and self-control, at last succeeds. The signal characteristic of the Homeric poetry--the simplicity and self-sufficing wholeness of its heroes--is best seen in Odysseus. He is never taken out of himself, never driven out of the limits of his own character, never the prey of introspective broodings or the victim of circumstance, but always the master of himself and of fortune."

Tossed and turned, incarcerated and abused, Odysseus is definitely a heroic victim, but despite his many challenges, he is "never driven out of the limits of his own character, never the prey of introspective broodings or the victim of circumstance, but always the master of himself and of fortune." Odysseus, qua Homer, sounds a lot like the sword and sorcery hero as defined by Jason M Waltz in the introduction to his most recent sword and sorcery anthology, Neither Beg Nor Yield (2024). For Waltz, the sword and sorcery hero is defined by their heroic adversity, their tenacity: "To ardently live, not merely survive, at any cost in the face of all odds, unequal or unnatural. LIVE!-ism."

The main character of Steve Dilks’ new sword and sorcery collection, Bohun: The Complete Savage Adventures, bears a striking resemblance to the adversity-laden hero described above, epitomizes what Waltz describes as "LIVE!-ism" and what Matthew Arnold articulates as the hero being "master of himself and of fortune": a hero who has horrible things happen to them and whose character is revealed through their reactions. Of the seven stories in this anthology, most begin with Bohun unjustly incarcerated, enslaved, or otherwise placed in circumstances he did not seek out. In the first story, "Festival of the Bull," Bohun arrives in the city-state of Tharyna having escaped from a slave ship, manacles still on his arms. In the second story, "Horror from the Stars," he soon finds himself trapped in a pitfall chamber. In the third story, "By Darkness Enthroned," he fights as a mercenary conscript in the armies of Valentia. In the fourth story, "Intrigue in Aviene," he is quickly thrown into the city jail. The fifth story, "Black Sunset in the Valley of Death," offers an intriguing exception: while Bohun starts out as a prisoner and intended blood sacrifice, he swiftly escapes and, for once, acts rather than reacts, making his own decisions. In the penultimate story, "Red Trail of Vengeance," Bohun is accosted by bandits and thrown into a well. Finally, in "Harvest of the Blood King," he is again in manacles but gains a conditional release to fight in a Valentian military operation. In nearly every case, Bohun’s character is revealed through his reactions to external forces.

This structure is not unique to sword and sorcery; numerous pulp adventure stories rely on a "catch and release" narrative, perhaps best exemplified by Edgar Rice Burroughs’ John Carter stories, where the protagonist is repeatedly imprisoned and escapes and is imprisoned again. However, Dilks’ use of this narrative structure is skillful and serves a distinct thematic purpose: it introduces us to a character who, in his heart, does not want to be a sword and sorcery hero. Despite his muscularity, his warrior prowess, Bohun just wants his wife, his domestic peace, his tranquility. He just wants to be left alone.

Over the course of these stories, we learn that Bohun’s people, the Damzullah, were destroyed. In "Festival of the Bull," he recounts his tragic past. A civil war in his homeland weakened the Damzullah, allowing their enemies, the cowardly Razuli, to attack. Later, as Bohun fled with his wife, Dana, she was captured by another group, the Gharubah. Thus, Bohun’s wandering is not fueled by curiosity or boredom, as it is for many sword and sorcery heroes. He is not a restless adventurer, but a man forced into this life through tragedy. His stories is not about the thrill of battle sought out but survival in a brutal world.

Indeed, brutality, both in war and social hierarchies, becomes a theme in the collection. One of its most striking moments of intellectual frisson comes near the end of the collection. After Bohun fights as a mercenary for the Empire of Valentia, his supposed victory leaves him disillusioned. His friend, Tiberius, a Valentian, mockingly tells him:

"'You’re heroes now […]. Freedom and gold are yours now. Let this be an end to war for all of us.'"

Bohun’s response, as he surveys the carnage, is telling:

"'Bohun glanced around at the slain children and the ravaged corpses of young mothers strewn throughout the compound. Through the smoke and burning ashes, he saw King Varak looming on his warhorse and Lucian Flava covered in white ash, looking like a specter of death.

"'As long as there are generals and kings, there will never be an end to war.'"

This is a defining moment for Bohun, an epiphany, a psychological event that brings about a change to his character. Just a few beats later, Bohun admits, "'I was not born for war.'" These words are remarkable for a sword and sorcery hero who has left a pile of bodies in his wake. Many contemporary figures in the genre--such as Willard Black’s Redgar, Matt John’s Maxus, D.M. Ritzlin’s Vran the Chaos-Warped, and Howie K. Bentley’s Eldol--are defined by agency, desire, momentum, their wild-card like ability to actually make things happen in and of themselves. But characters like Howard Andrew Jones’ Hanuvar, David C. Smith’s Hanlin, Chase A. Folmar’s Uralant and Emrasarie, and Bohun are different. They are not always reactive, but they find themselves in adventures due to circumstance rather than choice. If one major theme of sword and sorcery is the path of the self-driven adventurer dropped into an equilibrium to bring about creative disharmony, another is the reluctant warrior--the powerful quasi-martyr who responds to the brutal world's hammer falls of fate, and in ways that reveals their undeniable humanity.

Each of Bohun’s stories merits individual consideration. Without giving too much away, here are some highlights. "Festival of the Bull" features a gladiatorial battle gone awry, rich in the "dark of night" atmosphere characteristic of sword and sorcery. "Horror from the Stars" is one of the creepiest entries in the genre in recent years, featuring a monstrous transformation that lingers in the mind. "By Darkness Enthroned" is the most epic in scope, involving large-scale military conflict and compelling sorcery. "Intrigue in Aviene" is more focused on skullduggery, plotting, and assassination. "Red Trail of Vengeance," possibly my favorite, evokes the classic Western revenge film Unforgiven (1992) in its structure and themes. "Harvest of the Blood-King" feels like a final statement from Dilks on Bohun, leaving me wondering whether he is moving on from the character. But "Black Sunset in the Valley of Death" is the most enigmatic of the collection. Here, Bohun briefly integrates into a community and fights for them. In his moment of peace, the reader encounters a beautiful piece of writing that allegorizes an inherent tension in sword and sorcery: a violent, action-packed, often brutal genre that paradoxically offers relaxation, reflection, and quietude. Consider this passage, in which a wise woman tells the story of her tribe:

"'Ylarrna gave pause, and the listeners sighed, a lament that ripped through the glade. There, under the silvered moon, Bohun squatted before her on the ground. She sat high up between the two trunks of the towering trees that formed a natural throne--a throne of earth. Her stick lay across her knees, and as she looked down on the ring of listeners, her eyes were glazed with the memory of far sight. The pale stars were strewn across the heavens, and the jeweled eye in her brow radiated a soft glow. It seemed as if the listeners were dragged hypnotically into that eye now. Ylarrna’s voice began to intone again. As she did, windows of the past opened, and Bohun gazed on marvels both alien and strange.'"

This is powerful writing, and I cannot help but see it as a symbol of reading sword and sorcery itself: a moment of tranquility amid chaos, where the audience is drawn into a world of alien and strange marvels.

Steve Dilks’ Bohun stories are an impressive contribution to the genre, the collection a true accomplishment, standing alongside recent contemporary masterpieces such as David C. Smith’s Sometimes Lofty Towers (2021), Schuyler Hernstrom’s The Eye of Sounnu (2020) , and Howard Andrew Jones’ Lord of a Shattered Land (2024). In essence, Bohun's tales pay homage to the tradition of sword and sorcery while exploring the reluctant hero archetype whose advertsities reveal their worth and forge them into tempered steel. In other words, heroic power is not about control or dominance of others, the brutal tinsel crowns of status-threatened kings and generals. It's about answering that most pointed of questions posed by fate: Who are you? Bohun: "Do I look like a slave to you, dog? By T'agulla, the last man who thought as much is now holding counsel in hell!"

About the Reviewer: Jason Ray Carney is the Managing Editor of Spiral Tower and a Senior Lecturer in the Department of English of Christopher Newport University.

CNU Faculty Page. jrcarney52.bsky.social.

About Spiral Tower Reviews: The authors who maintain the pulp genres of sword and sorcery and cosmic horror merit support. Financial support is key but there are other ways the cash-strapped can show support: engaged reading and thoughtful analysis. Literary movements emerge through the interactions of editors, authors, publishers, and amateur literary journalists. Learn more about contributing your review here. We are happy to work with first time reviewers! No previous writing credits required!

Tanith Lee is the Empress of Dreams, review by George Jacobs
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TRIAPA Mailing #17


Spiral Tower Press has established an 'Amateur Press Association,' TRIAPA, and its sixteenth mailing is now available. We extend our sincere thanks to our excellent contributors. If you are interested in submitting a zine for TRIAPA #17 please send a 2-page zine (maximum) to spiraltowerpress@gmail.com with the subject of "TriAPA: [zine name]". We invite and encourage all fans of sword and sorcery, cosmic horror, and space opera to submit.

You can read more about TRIAPA HERE.

Download the most recent mailing here: TRIAPA Mailing #17

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